By Paul Elam
O.K., so you found some weed in your teen-agers room.
Depending on the kind of parent you are, your reaction to that can range from mild amusement to thermonuclear. But assuming you are not going to smoke the stuff yourself, you are confronted with making some decisions on what to do about it. Perhaps you think it is time to call a counselor, or maybe even the thought of a treatment center for young people with drug problems crosses your mind.
As someone who worked in the chemical dependency treatment field for two decades, and who wrote and directed several treatment programs, let me make a suggestion about that.
Don’t.
Don’t even think about it.
To clarify, let me tell you some things you won’t hear from the staff at treatment programs, or anyone else interested in making a buck off your child’s “problem.”
First, there‘s this funny thing about teenage drug addicts. There aren’t any. Or at least they are so far and few between that I can count the ones I have seen on two fingers. So for your benefit, an understanding of addiction is in order.